David Williams - funk guitar masterclass from Guitar Techniques magazine

This is a one off guitar masterclass that featured in Guitar Techniques GT119 with the late David Williams. After filming, David and Jason chatted about his career and playing. Here's part of the conversation:
DW - My attitude to recording has always been ‘this is the last time you’re going to do this so play your ass off!’. My audition track for the Off The Wall album was Rock With You. First take, I played the guitar part that features on the album. All I had to go on was the chart that they put in front of me, no parts were written, just the chords. So what I played was what I felt, interacting with the other guys' playing – Bobby Watson (bass), Greg Philliganes (keys), John Robinson (drums). While I’m reading the chart I’m catching the recording booth out the corner of my eye and I see Michael dancing around to the music, laughing and crying. And I’m trying to focus as I know everyone is checking me out, counting the bars and waiting for me to screw up. I was getting scrutinised. By the time I had finished the track I was a puddle of sweat. I was beyond nervous – Quincy Jones was there, Michael was there, and Bruce Swedien was there. It was Michael’s first solo record and they were very careful about who was going to play on it and the songs used. And Quincy wanted someone else and I was stuck in the middle, amidst all the politics right from the beginning.
It was a great feeling when the talk back button was pressed and I heard ‘everyone can go home now, David can handle the record.’ I sat there with my hand on my brow, looking down at the floor for quite a while as I couldn’t look at anybody. I felt the guitar players were all looking at me with scowls. The guitarists were Marlo Henderson, Dean Parks, David T Walker, Wah Wah Watson, Ray Parker Jr, Paul Jackson Jr, Phil Upchurch – basically THE main players in LA and the guys I idolised. I was brand new and had been in LA for no more that 5-6 months. I had been there all day watching them play as no-one knew who was going to get the gig. The others auditioned with songs like Working Day and Night. I think what happened with me was Quincy was calling the songs so he put one of the most difficult songs in front of me.
The next day, I heard someone utter ‘give him that lick from Off The Wall’ so Rod Temperton came over to me and hummed this lick in my ear. I’m going ‘oh, man’!! So, like I was saying, you have got to play your ass off, there is no ‘can I do it?’ or second chances. So I played the lick and everyone in the room was like, ‘oh shit, we can’t throw him no curve!’ Michael was laughing as he knew they were toying with me to see how much rhythm I could really play.
The great thing about Off The Wall is it’s pre-MIDI, pre-computers, drum machines or click tracks. It was all live except Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough which was done after the rest of the album had been recorded.
John Robinson and me really clicked on that record. My thing is I studied drum book rudiments when I was younger to help my right hand picking, going down-up. When I came to LA I was even getting drum books from Joe Porcaro, Jeff Porcaro’s father [Jeff was an A-list session drummer as well as Toto’s drummer]. I knew I was destined to do something in music, just not exactly what."

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